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		<title>Not a good day &lt;https://y.st./en/weblog/2016/08-August/20.xhtml&gt;</title>
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		<header>
			<h1>Not a good day</h1>
			<p>Day 00532: <time>Saturday, 2016 August 20</time></p>
		</header>
<p>
	Google locked up my new Google account today.
	They won&apos;t allow me to log into it from any device, instead insisting that I go through recovery options.
	However, the only recovery option (despite the fact that I have a recovery email address set up) is to go through a form that submits to what I believe to be human reviewers.
	This form asked for the month and year that I created the account and the month and year that I started using Google&apos;s email service on that account, both which of course were this month of this year.
	They also asked for who my frequently-contacted people were (the only people that I&apos;d contacted through the account were myself (for testing) and my mother) and the date of the last time that I&apos;d successfully logged into the account, which was yesterday.
	They keep rejecting my attempts to recover the account though.
	I decided just to ignore the account and create a new one, as there wasn&apos;t anything else that I could do.
	However, Google wouldn&apos;t allow me to create the new account.
	As usual, Google demanded a telephone number for &quot;verification&quot; (read: Google demanded a telephone number to be nosy and over-controlling), so I provided the only number that I have.
	Google rejected this number, saying that it&apos;d been used to &quot;verify&quot; too many accounts already.
	So I guess that two accounts is the limit, (The first account that I &quot;verified&quot; with that number, I later deleted that same day).
	Google is such a pain.
	Why did they lock up the account in the first place?
</p>
<p>
	While trying to get Google to actually function, which I never managed to do,my Wi-Fi card gave out on me.
	That was frustrating.
	I needed to monitor my temporary inbox for letters from Google&apos;s team to get my account back, but I couldn&apos;t reach the Internet without my mobile.
	Rebooting the machine a few times didn&apos;t restore functionality to the Wi-Fi card, but with some help from someone on <a href="ircs://irc.oftc.net.:9967/%23Debian">#Debian</a>, I finally found a working solution.
	They said to turn off the machine and take the battery entirely out for a minute, then put it back in and try again.
	I never did figure out why my Wi-Fi card went out on me in the first place, but the power in the battery must have caused some internal state of the machine to not fully reset, causing the Wi-Fi card issues to be persistent.
</p>
<p>
	FedEx sent me an alert that they planned to deliver my FreedomPop <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card &quot;tomorrow&quot;, on 2016-08-20.
	However, <strong>*today*</strong> is 2016-08-20! I&apos;d say that the alert must have come from another time zone, but FedEx is a United States-based company and the alert happened too late in the day to have been correct in another time zone of this country.
	Later, I received another letter from them saying that the card had been delivered, so I went outside to check; it wasn&apos;t there.
	I went to the tracking page (FedEx, unlike the United States Postal Service, does <strong>*not*</strong> maliciously discriminate against <abbr title="The Onion Router">Tor</abbr> users), and found a surprise there.
	It said that the package had been delivered by the <abbr title="United States Postal Service">USPS</abbr>! Why did the <abbr title="United States Postal Service">USPS</abbr> deliver a FedEx shipment? Alternatively, how was a <abbr title="United States Postal Service">USPS</abbr> shipment tracked on the FedEx website? I walked down to the mailbox to investigate.
	Sure enough, the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card had arrived, as did the GT-i9100, both a bit ahead of schedule.
</p>
<p>
	With the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card in hand, I now looked into canceling my FreedomPop service.
	I tried to cancel the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card order as soon as I found out that their service wasn&apos;t as advertised, but FreedomPop support took so long to get to me that they&apos;d already sent the card.
	First, I turned off the paid plan for the account, which FreedomPop puts you on (with a one-month gratis trial) by default.
	They probably hope that you&apos;ll forget to turn it off in time and end up having to pay for it; they don&apos;t give you the option to opt out of the trial when buying the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card or allow you to automatically revert to the gratis plan when the trial is over.
	It&apos;s a bit sneaky.
	Next, I tried to disable automatic top-ups, which cause FreedomPop to charge you as soon as you get near the end of your data limit, then use that money to pay for any extra data that you might or might not actually use.
	They should instead simply cut off your data when you hit your limit, but they&apos;d rather do things the underhanded way.
	However, they charge a five-dollar fee for turning automatic account top-ups off! As the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card won&apos;t be in a device anyway, I just left it alone instead of paying the fee.
	I can&apos;t go over if the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card isn&apos;t powered on and connected to a radio.
	Next, I tried to cancel my plan and deactivate the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card.
	I couldn&apos;t find a way to directly do that though.
	I can deactivate the account itself, but if I do that, there&apos;s a $20 <abbr title="United States Dollars">USD</abbr> fee if I ever want to come back to FreedomPop.
	If FreedomPop cleans up their service, I might one day want to come back, so I decided not to deactivate the whole account.
	I found some information that hints that if I don&apos;t use the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card at all for about a month, they might <a href="https://support.freedompop.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2046/kw/deactivate">deactivate the <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card themselves</a> though, so I guess that I&apos;ll just wait for that.
</p>
<p>
	The first thing that I did with the GT-i9100 was check behind the battery for the model number.
	Would it be another GT-I727? No! The model number was clearly GT-i9100 as ordered, or at least it seemed that way at first.
	As the device was second hand, I wanted to be sure that it would actually connect to the towers, so I moved my <abbr title="subscriber identity module">SIM</abbr> card to the device and booted it.
	Much to my confusion, the boot screen informed me that this wasn&apos;t a GT-i9100, but a GT-i9100G.
	THat is a GT-i9100G? Is it the same thing as a GT-i9100? Will it run the necessary operating system? As it turns out, no, no it is not and no it will not.
	THe <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org./wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_S_II#Galaxy_S_II_-_Model_GT-I9100G">GT-i9100G</a> has a different chip set as the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org./wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_S_II#Model:_GT-i9100">GT-i9100</a> and cannot run the same system images.
	It sounds like this version of the device might even be a bit easier to develop on in freedom than the GT-i9100, but as the Replicant team is under-staffed and under-funded, this hasn&apos;t happened yet.
	Why do these models have confusingly similar model numbers though? The fact that the product was incorrectly labeled as a GT-i9100 might have been an honest mistake even, caused by Samsung&apos;s similar model numbers and the incorrect model number being listed behind the battery.
	The similar model numbers don&apos;t end there though.
	It seems that the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org./wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_S_II#Bell_Mobility_-_Models_GT-I9100M_and_SGH-I757M">GT-i9100M</a> might in fact have identical hardware as the GT-i9100, differeing only in default software.
	It&apos;s said that it can run system images designed for the GT-i9100 because of the identical hardware.
	Likewise, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org./wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_S_II#Europe_-_Model_GT-I9100P">GT-i9100P</a> is supposed to be nearly identical to the GT-i9100, differing only in that it has <strong>*extra*</strong> hardware.
	Supposedly, this device can run system images meant for the GT-i9100 as well, though as these images aren&apos;t designed to use the extra hardware, that extra hardware becomes unusable, basically turning it into a regular GT-i9100.
	We also have the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org./wiki/Samsung_Galaxy_S_II#Telstra_and_Vodafone_Australia_-_Models_GT-I9100T">GT-i9100T</a>.
	Wikipedia doesn&apos;t have much information on this device, staring that it&apos;s &quot;functionally equivalent&quot; to the GT-i9100.
	WHat does that mean? Does it mean that it can run the same system images? If not, that&apos;s hardly equivalent, but if so, it should be stated as such.
	Lastly, there might even be a <a href="https://redmine.replicant.us/boards/3/topics/12009">GT-i9100I</a>, though Wikipedia doesn&apos;t seem to have any information on it, assuming that it really exists.
	I&apos;ve asked if the GT-i9100M can really <a href="https://redmine.replicant.us/boards/3/topics/13509">run the Replicant system image</a> just to be sure, but I&apos;m not sure that I&apos;ll receive a response, as it&apos;s not one of the most popular mobile systems and people might not have tried it.
</p>
<p>
	I reported the device to the seller as not being as listed, requesting a refund.
	They responded telling me that my request will be granted and to send it back.
	I won&apos;t be able to do that tonight, as the post office has already closed, or tomorrow, as they won&apos;t be open that day.
	I&apos;ll try to get it sent on Monday.
	Unlike the last seller, this one didn&apos;t supply postage, but did say that they&apos;d refund any postage fees that I paid.
	Furthermore, they said that if the post office won&apos;t allow me to send the battery, to remove the battery and send back the device.
	I don&apos;t anticipate such a problem, but I suppose it&apos;s always good to walk in prepared.
</p>
<p>
	I found a new mobile listed online as being a GT-i9100, though in the information about the device&apos;s condition, it says that it&apos;s really the GT-i9100M.
	Assuming that Wikipedia is correct, a device of either model should suffice, so I&apos;ve ordered it.
	Unfortunately, with each try, the device gets more expensive.
	This time, it cost me $100 <abbr title="United States Dollars">USD</abbr>.
	Hopefully this time, I&apos;ll get what I actually paid for.
	If not, I might give up and choose an easier device to get ahold of.
	Last time, I had less idea of what I was doing and I still managed to get a <strong>*GT-i9300*</strong> on the first try.
	That might be a good device to try to reacquire, though it will also be more expensive and potentially less functional.
	The GT-i9100 is stated to be the most featureful Replicant device.
</p>
<p>
	About two days overdue to get started, I dived into this week&apos;s University of <span class="redacted">[REDACTED]</span> orientation material.
	Trying to make sure that my late start didn&apos;t cause any issues later in the week, I made sure to finish today as well.
	Besides, I needed something to do while I waited for Google to respond to my attempts to get back into my account.
	Unfortunately, it seems that the school library is hidden behind a CloudFlare <abbr title="Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart">CAPTCHA</abbr> wall, so I suppose once school starts, that&apos;ll be something that I need to complain about, at least once per course, but probably not more than on a weekly basis.
	It would be nice if they got that fixed, though I need to make sure not to be annoying about it, so I&apos;ll probably lean closer to the once-per-course frequency.
	The school also mentioned a school-specific social network that they have for students, faculty, and former students, though they didn&apos;t at all mention where it was or how to find it.
	I wrote to my program advisor to ask about it, though admittedly, half the reason that I asked was just to make contact and show that I&apos;m really here and did receive their initial email to me.
	The assignment for this week was to mark a few dates on whatever calendar system we each use.
	Unfortunately, my calendar is down when my server&apos;s down, so I won&apos;t be able to do that until we once more have a home Internet connection.
	I went to their list of dates to copy them into a plain text file for now, but their dates are displayed in the form of an image.
	Really? What is the point of that? I&apos;ve saved the image for now.
	I&apos;ll type the dates into the calendar when can.
	In particular, the school wanted me to note the following dates:
</p>
<ol>
<li value="0">The first day of the term</li>
<li value="1">The Course Drop deadline</li>
<li value="2">The Course Withdrawal deadline</li>
<li value="3">The beginning and end dates for registration</li>
<li value="4">When final exams begin</li>
<li value="5">When final exams end</li>
</ol>
<p>
	Looking for a Google-free solution to my <abbr title="Short Message Service">SMS</abbr> problem, I tried out a service called <a href="https://textfree.us/">TextFree</a>.
	They&apos;re Web-based, so they lack the email integration that Google Voice has, but if I could get their system to work, it&apos;d be better than nothing.
	During registration, they asked me for an email address but not a telephone number, but then after verifying my email address, they blindsided me by demanding that I verify the account again by verify a telephone number, a Google account, or a Facebook account! That was not happening.
	I tried reloading the page though, and that seemed to work.
	My log in credentials work anyway, though I can&apos;t seem to actually send <abbr title="Short Message Service">SMS</abbr> messages.
	After submitting one, the page just sort of hangs and the message doesn&apos;t get through.
	Furthermore, every time that I log in, my <abbr title="Short Message Service">SMS</abbr> number changes.
	That won&apos;t at all work for conversing with my mother, which is the only thing that I need <abbr title="Short Message Service">SMS</abbr> messaging for.
	Maybe I can find another solution elsewhere.
</p>
<section id="docmod">
	<h2>Document modifications</h2>
	<p>
		On <a href="/en/weblog/2017/11-November/02.xhtml">2017-11-02</a>, this journal page was modified in order to redact the name of the university and the link to their website.
	</p>
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